Intersting.

[bladespark]

Ten things Christians and Atheists can -and must- agree on.

The writing style is anyting but scholarly, but this is actually a pretty well-thought-out little article. It sums up the realities of the "war" between the two rather well.

Comments

[aoanla.livejournal.com]

I can quibble extensively with point 7, especially over his trivial mistakes with free will (even if someone doesn't have "free will", telling them that they'll suffer some punishment for doing action "X" is a valid approach... because it represents another influence on their unfree behavior. The same applies to having punishments for crimes, etc.), and similarly, "love" is clearly an emotional state and there's no reason we shouldn't have a word for it...

Of course, the rest of the article suffers from the problem that the real issue is with zealotry of all persuasions, and zealots are hardly likely to agree on any common ground with their opponents. Indeed, there appears to be a tendency in any group to begin to "dehumanise" their opponents, leading to precisely the opposite effect.

[bladespark.livejournal.com]

I rather assumed that part of the point of the article was that most of the people on both sides are not zealots.

[aoanla.livejournal.com]

Yes, but this is obvious to anyone on either side who isn't a zealot, is my point.

[bladespark.livejournal.com]

I dunno... I suppose it depends on how you define "zealot." There are a lot of people like my mother. She lives in the Happy Mormon Bubble. I suspect she doesn't realize that a lot of those are things she and an atheist would have in common, because she doesn't really know, or really think about, any atheists other than the high-profile anti-Christian sort. There are folks on both sides that just don't see the non-zealots, and think the other side is nothing but the caricatures and stereotypes. They spend their time in their own closed social circles, where everybody is more or less just like them, and have no real concept of what people "out there" are actually like. But are they themselves zealots?

[aoanla.livejournal.com]

They're sort of zealots-by-circumstance, in some sense, I suppose - they might agree strongly with some comments by zealots in their cultural zone, purely because they don't know any better.
I'd argue that people not bothering to explore beyond their own cultural bubble (for whatever reason) is one of the major causes of problems in society anyway, though.

[bladespark.livejournal.com]

Also, re: "dehumanizing" the other side, see point 6.

[rigger.livejournal.com]

A very good read with a lot of interesting points. And I'm certain most anyone who reads the article can agree with the points therein.

Although I have to admit I found the most pithy wisdom in that last graphic: "Hey, Let's try not being dicks today" just about sums it all up.

[malakim2099.livejournal.com]

Which, when you think about it... was really what Jesus was trying to teach, in a nutshell.

"Hey, you guys, let's try not to be dicks today!"

Unfortunately, it wasn't as catchy back then...